Aerosol-assisted chemical vapor deposition of copper: A liquid delivery approach to metal thin films

Aerosol-assisted chemical vapor deposition has been used to attain high deposition rates (up to 800 Å min−1 at 140 °C) of crystalline, low-resistivity (1.7–3.5 μΩ cm) Cu films at low temperatures (120–200 °C) from toluene solutions of (hfac)Cu(1,5-COD), where 1,5-COD=1,5-cyclooctadiene, in a warm-wall reactor. Activation energies calculated from the deposition rate as a function of the preheating temperatures and the substrate temperature (varying also the nozzle-substrate distance) were 6.8, 8.9 (0.7 cm), and 9.1 (1.7 cm) kcal mol−1, respectively. The activation energy of 6.8 kcal mol−1 is similar to the enthalpy of vaporization of (hfac)Cu(1,5-COD).